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[DavieTait]

2:49pm UK, Thursday December 15, 2011
A US satellite company has said it has taken photographs of sea trials taking place for China's first aircraft carrier.

The as-yet unnamed carrier is the former Soviet Varyag which was bought from Ukraine in 1998.

It has undergone years of refurbishment after it was sold without engines, weaponry and navigation systems.

The images, captured by Digitalglobe, are believed to have been the first time the 300ft ship has been photographed since it was first dispatched for trials in August.

The trials, which have been kept relatively low-key, have drawn considerable attention from around the world as China has not previously been regarded as an international military power.

Japan has been keeping an especially close eye on the carrier's movements as defence experts are wary of the Chinese navy's increasing presence in Japanese waters.

China has said the carrier is intended for research and training, leading to speculation that it plans to build future copies.

A statement issued by the Defence Ministry in November said the exercises were not directed toward "any particular country or objective".

While no major problems have been reported in making the 55,000-ton ski jump-style carrier seaworthy, Beijing is believed to be years away from being able to launch and recover aircraft from it as part of a carrier battle group.

[Shipmate60]

But they will learn or buy expertise.

Bob

[DavieTait]

They've had a lot of help off Russia over the last 5 years , they've also got a full sized mock up of the carrier built well inland so they could practice deck ops so expect them to be surprisingly quick to get up to speed on carrier ops

[philk]

think you might find shes a wee bit longer than 300 ft think you'll find thats metres
or there going to use very small aircraft

phil

[tigertiger]

More from the Telegraph

While its decks have been given a fresh coat of paint and heat resistant tiles installed the carrier is understood to be missing arrestor wires used to prevent jet fighters going into the sea after landing.
But after an initial sea trial ended in uncertainty over how advanced the warship had become there is growing speculation that the ship is developing apace and is likely to field a strike force before the Royal Navy's own new carriers come into service.
Satellite footage grabbed by the GlobalGlobe commercial system has shown that the former Russian carrier Varyag sailing into the Yellow Sea without arrestor wires according to analysts from Jane's Defence Weekly.
China has been desperate to acquire the arrestor system but has fallen out with Russia, the only likely seller, over Beijing's alleged reverse-engineering of the Sukhoi 33 carrier jet.
However, there is a possibility that Ukraine, which was given the Varyag by Russia at the break up of the Soviet Union, might have sold on the system which is costing £800 million to install one British carrier.
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China's has long held the desire to become a "blue water" navy to be able to project its power and protect its interests around the globe, particularly off Africa and in the Middle East.
Having a substantial fleet is key to that aspiration and for the last two decades they have been playing the long game in building a carrier strike force.
While operating carriers is highly complex Beijing has gone to great lengths to train its pilots from scratch including construction of a concrete carrier far in land.
Most analysts expect it will take at least six years before they can start any form of operations after training both pilots and deck crew as well as installing the arrestor wires.
There are also reports that the displacement has increased by 8,000 tonnes to 67,000 tonnes suggesting extra internal mechanisms have been installed.
This has given rise to speculation that the arrestor system might have been installed but the wires have not yet been strung across the flight deck.
"They cannot do anything with the carrier until they have arrestor wires on it," said Richard Scott, Jane's naval expert. "But this is not a show stopper. They will either acquire it or develop it themselves."

[Liverbudgie2]

What amazes me about this picture is the remarkable clarity of the image with no apparent distortion anywhere so, is a sat picture or one from a high flying aircraft one wonders?

LB